Editorial: Louisiana must take better care of its children

When you live in a state ranked at or near the bottom of the rankings of the 50 states as often as Louisiana, you learn to take being last philosophically.

When you live in a state ranked at or near the bottom of the rankings of the 50 states as often as Louisiana, you learn to take being last philosophically.

Some of the rankings do not bother us as much as others.

But when you are 49th among the states in overall child well-being, it is not possible to take such a ranking lightly, or to shrug it off as one might shrug off having, say, the 49th lowest savings rate in the nation.

The size of one’s savings account is often affected by personal decisions, but the well-being of a child is largely dependent upon others, family, government and society as a whole.

According to the 20th annual KIDS COUNT Data Book, published by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, Louisiana ranks 49th in overall child well-being.

The report says Louisiana children are much more likely to experience a number of negative outcomes than peers in states with better rankings.

The state’s child poverty rate in 2007 was the second highest in the nation. A total of 27 percent of state children lived in poverty that year, significantly higher than the national average, 18 percent, and three times higher than the lowest rate in New Hampshire.

And Louisiana ranked in the bottom ten states for child death rate, teen birth rate, high school dropouts and teens who are not in school and not working.

We like to think that Louisiana is progressing, thanks in part to the huge amounts of federal funding coming in the wake of the hurricanes. We’ve been spared much of the agony experienced in other parts of the nation due to the national recession.

But as far as children in the state are concerned, Louisiana’s data either stayed the same or sank worse on three indicators that have significant impact on a child’s economic well-being.

All the people leaving Louisiana, making it the only Southern state that consistently loses population, must be doing so for a reason.

Maybe they do not want to live in a state that can’t take better care of its future, the children of the state.